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WHEN THE SUN ROSE 

IN 

THE WEST. 

A STORY OF THE FffiST ADVENT 
With a Japanese Setting. 


BY JOHN PAUL. 

Vice-President, Asbury College; Preacher for Inter- 
Denominational Conventions, Japan, 1917. 



Pentecostal Publishing Company 
Louisville, Ky. 


Copyright, 1917, by 
Pentecostal Publishing Company. 

mar 16 1918 


©CI.A492593 


CONTENTS. 

I. The Secret Execution ... 7 

II. The Miraculous Visitor 1 1 

III. The Supreme Test 17 

IV. A New Lease on Life 22 

V. At Japan’s Golden Gate.. .25 

VI. Caesar’s Frown 32 

VII. Sunset 35 










INTRODUCTORY 


HERE was a time when, for 
those concerned about eternal 
life, all roads led to Jerusalem. 
An agitation is said to have gone 
throughout the East when our 
Savior was born. In the ap- 
pointment of Divine providence, wise 
men were met on their own plane of 
thinking; and, in terms or symbols fa- 
miliar to them, were given communica- 
tions designed to introduce them to the 
new-born King of Righteousness. Uni- 
versal unrest obtained, leading to the 
collapse of old systems, to pilgrimages 
after something better, and to improv- 
ing and revamping of pagan creeds, in 
poor attempts to satisfy the universal 
cry of the human heart. 

There was not only the “other” wise 
man, as one writer has expressed it, but 
there were many other wise men; and, 
while they did not all adopt the method 
of those wise men recorded by Saint 
Matthew, it may be assumed that many 
others did as certainly make reports, 
although the effect of their reports will 
remain shrouded in as much mystery as 
surrounds the final report of those wise 
men from the East who returned “into 
their own country another way.” 

It was about this time that Japan was 
making the religion of Shintoism for its 
( 5 ) 



hungry-hearted multitudes, the incom- 
pleteness of which she later recognized, 
and tried to supplement with Buddhism. 
We may mention, as giving a cue to part 
of this story, the theory of a prominent 
non-Christian Japanese professor, now 
in one of the Imperial Universities, that 
the early tides of immigration to Japan, 
representing the present population, 
were from regions adjacent to Judea, 
and brought with them certain ideas of 
the Hebrew religion, which they sought 
to work out in the system of Shintoism. 
Certainly their Shinto temples seem pat- 
terned like Solomon’s temple, and they 
have the shewbread, and the laver ; and 
their priests are clad in striking likeness 
to the Hebrew priests. Then the red 
torii, all their own invention, is thought 
by some considerable religious author- 
ities to have a remote reference to the 
blood-sprinkled door posts of the first 
passover. 

The professor to whom we refer, 
thinks that a group of the immigrants 
landed in the province of Izumo (Pro- 
nounced Ezoomo) and named it in honor 
of their old home in Edom, being them- 
selves descendant from Abraham 
through Esau, and selecting religious 
tenets and forms from the religion of 
Jacob’s tribe. All this is for the reader 
to dispose of as his judgment dictates; 
it merely slants up to the reason why we 
find the hero of our story beginning his 
career at Matsue, in the province of 
Izumo. 


( 6 ) 


WHEN THE SUN ROSE IN 
THE WEST. 


CHAPTER I. 

The Secret Execution. 

BOUT the time that the Christ 
was born, there lived in Matsue, 
Japan, a growing young trader, 
known as Kimura Jimbo San. 
He was less than thirty years 
old, the son of a prominent 
family. It was one bright spring morn- 
ing, just after the rising of an early 
mist, that Kimura sat in the gate of his 
ancestral home and saw his father, be- 
ginning to totter a little with age, walk 
up the hillside by a private path toward 
his place of prayer. No day ever seemed 
farther removed from exceptional 
events than this one. Young Kimura 
was engaged, partly in reverie and part- 
ly in reflection upon business matters, 
little suspecting that this day should 
mark the beginning of the end of his 
career as a business man. As the recit- 
ing of what immediately followed in- 
volves somewhat of responsibility, we 
shall let young Kimura himself state 
the events, and expound them, in the 
light of his own observations. Begin- 
ning at the time when he saw his father 
( 7 ) 



When the Sun Rose in the West, 


disappear up the path to the place of 
prayer, he says : 

“A brief half hour seems only to have 
passed, when a squad of soldiers, known 
as the executioners, armed with swords 
and bows and arrows, came down the 
hillside and passed into the road. A 
strange and formidable look was on 
their faces as they glanced toward the 
house, and I was chilled with horror. 

“A year before, my father had been 
given a secret trial by a busy religious 
prosecutor, before the prefectural judge, 
who sent him, by an officer, to be exam- 
ined before a company of Shinto priests, 
for heresy in regard to the existence of 
gods, and for want of fidelity to the an- 
cestors. It was alleged that permitting 
an infiuential man like him to withhold 
worship from the departed spirits of the 
ancestors had caused a plague, a storm, 
and an invasion of wild animals in the 
prefecture. He tried to convince the 
priests that he respected the ancestry as 
much as they, but that a heavenly sig- 
nal had been given him, approving his 
worship of the one living and true God, 
and that he could not compromise. The 
priests, eager to save his useful life, 
asked him to erect a torii over his path 
which led to the place of prayer, and 
thus impress the officials that he had no 
disposition to dishonor the religious 
compact by which the peace of the tribes 
( 8 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


was established. He consented ; though 
he was never sure afterward that this 
act did not represent weakness instead 
of wisdom on his part. He, however, be- 
lieved that the torii had some spiritual 
meaning in the past, and some prophetic 
meaning which pertains to our salva- 
tion. Once, in a vision he had seen a 
mystical torii through which all the 
Japanese nation seemed to be passing, 
up to the altars of the true and living 
God. He looked for this spiritual gate 
to open in Japan; but could not tell 
whether it would be soon or late. He 
escaped from that trouble, through the 
friendship of the priests, who interced- 
ed for him. But our rulers try men 
without letting them hear about it, and 
pronounce and execute sentences with- 
out serving notice; so, when I saw the 
squad of soldiers, I had horrible fore- 
bodings, for I knew not what might 
have developed lately under the myste- 
rious cover of the Courts. 

“I could not venture to go and see 
about my father after the soldiers pass- 
ed, but sent a neighbor, who found that 
while my father was kneeling in prayer, 
an evil sentence had been executed. The 
soldiers had pierced his body through 
with many arrows, and he was dead. 
Though treated as a foreigner and 
stranger, he was the true type of our 
new Japanese people, of whom our 
( 9 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


country needed an increasing number. 
He should have been regarded the high- 
est of all high priests in Japan, refusing 
as he did to have his principles poisoned 
by the foolish superstitions of the dark 
aborigines who were being assimilated 
or driven back before us.” 

The night following his father’s 
burial young Kimura spent in prayer. 
Till then, he was a busy trader and a 
man of affairs; but his father’s mantle 
fell on him, and he received his call that 
night, together with an order to depart 
out of his country, to a place where he 
should meet men from distant lands, 
whose eyes would supplement his vis- 
ion ; and hence, perhaps too slowly, but 
certainly with the purpose of obeying, 
he began to adjust his affairs in Matsue 
with a view to leaving. He had his eyes 
on a port which he was sure would 
answer to the one shown him in the vis- 
ion, as his future base of operation. 


( 10 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


CHAPTER II. 

The Miraculous Visitor. 

IMURA came near staying too 
long in Matsue, adjusting his 
affairs, before he gave heed to 
the vision and obeyed the call 
that came to him on that night 
of prayer. He should easily 
have foreseen that the same charges 
which were preferred against his father 
would be filed against him, as he was 
following in his father’s footsteps. But 
a strange power had come on him the 
night after the funeral, and he could not 
feel afraid, and would not retreat. He 
had friends at the seat of the local gov- 
ernment, and the chief commander of 
the prefectural guard was secretly en- 
amored of his father’s views and deeply 
mortified over the official murder of the 
elder Kimura. At the time of a great 
battle, some years before, this chief cap- 
tain had come to the elder Kimura for 
a blessing on his forces, and this bless- 
ing had been followed by a military vic- 
tory of lasting effect over the Northern 
natives. Consequently, the captain felt 
very much as Balak would have felt if 
some underlings had tried and executed 
( 11 ) 



When the Sun Rose in the West. 


Baalam. It was natural, therefore, that 
the younger Kimura should feel himself 
secure, and quite natural to assume that 
an execution parallel with that of his 
father could never take place in Matsue 
again. 

A year passed before notice was taken 
of the fact that Kimura was following 
in his father’s footsteps; but the old 
enemy tried again the game of prefer- 
ring secret charges against him. This 
time, however, the indictment came un- 
der the eyes of friends, who demanded 
that the court should hear an argument 
for the condemned man, and should per- 
mit him to appear and answer for him- 
self. The defending attorney was ac- 
quainted with the traditions of the 
Japanese, and was accorded freedom of 
speech, to present Kimura’s side. Being 
a man of independent and progressive 
temperament, the attorney spoke with 
an aggressiveness that might easily en- 
danger his own life. His views of gov- 
ernment and religious tolerance were 
eighteen centuries ahead of his time; 
and the occasion of his speech impro- 
vised a sounding board that caused his 
words to echo from the Inland Sea to 
Hokkaido and the Bay of Tokio. This 
quotation from his speech will give an 
insight to the traditions which have been 
fostered in the Land of the Rising Sun. 
He said : 


( 12) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


“When our people came to this coast 
six hundred years ago, they brought ex- 
actly the convictions which are held by 
Kimura San. In our ambition to build a 
great nation, we sought to conciliate the 
dark natives, who were too strong for 
us, by humoring what we then called 
their superstition with regard to the 
spirits of the ancestors and the existence 
of a variety of gods. In another cen- 
tury, we began to take their doctrines 
seriously; and, now, the fusion is so 
complete that we cannot distinguish 
what we brought here from what we 
found when we came. It is a well known 
fact that we have always had a small 
group who clung to the traditions inci- 
dental to the doctrine of one God ; and it 
is not proved that the evils which have 
befallen us have been because of these 
people. Indeed their lives have been so 
high above the average morals of our 
race that their very cleanness of habit 
has been a provocation to the naturally 
suspicious mind of the Shinto, inducing 
charges of all kinds of witchcraft. It is 
a fact that we have ceased to suffer 
from tribal differences on account of re- 
ligion ; and it is childish in us to suppose 
that the spirits of the ancestors are 
grieved with the community because of 
the fact that a few people accord honor 
to the Almighty and to Him only. I 
thefore request this honorable court to 
( 13 ) 


yVHEN THE Sun Rose in the West. 


dismiss our worthy subject, and treat no 
further with men who institute prosecu- 
tions upon religious grounds.” 

The lines being thus sharply drawn, 
the Shintoists imbibed a fanatical de- 
termination which was soon to result in 
the driving out of every trace of the 
true religion of the ancients from the 
great land of Hondo. 

Kimura was sentenced to be boiled to 
death in a bath ; and was given till the 
second day at noon to prepare himself. 
That night as he prayed to God in the 
silence of his prison, a mysterious man 
stood by him and gave him advice. He 
was counseled to command his family to 
take a boat which was to sail next morn- 
ing for Moji, before the fury of the mob 
should fall upon them, after the execu- 
tion of his sentence. He was also told 
by this visitor that events were taking 
place in the land beyond the floods, from 
whence his fathers came, which would 
bring good tidings to all nations, includ- 
ing Japan; “But, by their own wilful- 
ness and cruelty,” said the voice in the 
vision, “Your people in this beautiful 
world have judged themselves unworthy 
of early benefits; and the Sun of Peace 
which now shines upon the cradle of 
your tribe shall be late in rising on Ja- 
pan. Yet the prayers of your fathers 
have been heard; and some day the 
glory of the Lord shall beautify this 
( 14 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


chosen island. But earthquakes first 
must shake it; and storms must sweep 
it; and those who dip My servants in 
boiling baths must see their country 
bathed in blood, before the Healer of 
Hearts shall walk their village streets.” 
Kimura had not time to ask with regard 
to his own sentence or make a request, 
ere the visitor was gone. He remem- 
bered this voice as the same that had 
spoken to him out of the darkness on 
the night after his father’s funeral. The 
call which he had received on that first 
visit had been worded in speech that 
was hard to understand; but it seemed 
clear to Kimura that he was directed to 
leave Hondo and remove to Kyushu, 
from under the jurisdiction of the 
Hondo daimyos ; to build him a house on 
the coast of pearls, learn from the pass- 
ing ships the location of the Prince of 
Peace, and, leaving his family, make a 
pilgrimage and bring Christ back to 
Japan. 

Unspeakable agony came into Kim- 
ura’s mind when he awoke to the fact 
that he had permitted the strange visi- 
tor to depart without asking of all these 
matters, and making a plea with regard 
to his lost call. “I have sinned,” he 
muttered to himself, in choking tones of 
despair. “I have sinned an unpardon- 
able sin. I was told a year ago by this 
same Divine visitor to proceed to Kyu- 
( 15 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


shu, out of reach of these officials, and 
begin planning my pilgrimage in search 
of Japan’s Savior; but I trusted in hu- 
man protection, and awaited my own 
convenience to obey God’s order. For 
the sake of a little property and the ar- 
ranging of a little earthly business, I 
have caused my family to be sent away 
in desolation and gloom; and my own 
life, which had the promise of Divine 
honor, I have caused to be cut short in 
failure if not in dishonor.” Then he 
prayed: “Great God, whom my fathers 
worshipped ! If with my life I must pay 
the penalty of my stupid disobedience, 
have mercy upon my soul.” 


(16) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


CHAPTER III. 

The Supreme Test. 

f ^teEFORE the day had dawned, 
the restless guard consented to 
m convey to Kimura’s family a 
^ message, and let his wife come 
^ and receive words from him at 
the prison door. He gave them 
his command to go to Moji on the ship 
which was to sail that morning; and, 
when he had become very stern in his 
words, his wife, with bitter reluctance, 
consented to go. Taking with them 
their money and movable stuff, they 
dragged themselves sorrowfully on to 
the ship about the third hour of the day. 
All the town seemed draped in mourn- 
ing ; all the trees looked sad ; every wave 
that lashed the beach seemed filled with 
moans and wails, and every flapping of 
the sails sounded like the sigh of a dy- 
ing man. Silent tears, like early morn- 
ing rain, poured from the eyes of the 
lonely woman whose honored husband, 
though living, was dead; and the little 
children clutched her skirts in sup- 
pressed terror. Off through the waters 
went the graceful ship, carrying the lit- 
tle company whose hearts were in the 
( 17 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


Matsue prison ; whose hearts, may I say, 
without straining a figure, were soon 
to be boiled. They landed in Moji, 
dazed ; so nearly without their wits that 
a petty officer had to cross-question 
them before he could get them to wish 
for a lodging place. The cloud hung so 
heavily upon them that it was some days 
before they could think to secure a 
small house and begin plans for the fu- 
ture. But eventually they composed 
themselves and set their faces bravely 
toward life, determined to make the best 
of it. For a while they must propel 
themselves along without impulse or in- 
centive, till they should be able to take 
heart again. 

On the next day after the departure 
of the Moji ship, when the shade of the 
prison roof reached a certain mark in 
the sunlight, Kimura was led forth to 
his boiling bath. When, by order of the 
officer, he stepped into the water it was 
already hot to the point of torture ; but 
the executioner increased the fire of the 
furnace from an outside door till the 
steam of boiling water was coming in 
plumes from every crack of the enclos- 
ure, sufficient to remove the flesh from 
a man suspended anywhere above it. 
Then the officer, who had watched into 
the evening, went his way to sleep. 
There was threatening and subdued ex- 
citement in the community through the 
( 18 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


day ; but that instinctive horror of death 
to which all men are heirs, deterred 
anyone from opening the door upon the 
condemned culprit’s boiling bath till the 
next day. The executioner left orders 
with a prison servant to authorize 
Kimura’s family to take charge of his 
remains ; though the servant did no 
more than shout the notice excitedly at 
the door of the vacant house, taking 
the echo of his own voice for a reply. 
But Kimura was not dead! After the 
first few minutes of torture he was not 
even aware that the water had been 
above the temperature of his customary 
bath. We cannot say whether this was 
due to a miscalculation of the execu- 
tioner or to a miracle, though indica- 
tions pointed to the latter. Kimura him- 
self could not explain; though he knew 
that whatever the explanation should be, 
a Divine deliverance had come, and he 
was sure that it had been extended in 
order that he might repent and fulfil his 
life’s calling. About midnight he put on 
his kimono, which had been carelessly 
dropped at the door, and departed from 
Matsue, over a mountain trail, setting 
his face toward Shimonoseki, which 
stands on the Straits opposite Moji. He 
had no serious fear of being pursued, 
for all thought he was dead. He jour- 
neyed steadily, as strength permitted, 
feeding upon the natural products by 
( 19 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


the road; but he missed his path, and, 
in his eager excitement, traveled much 
out of his course, being several days in 
reaching Shimonoseki. When he ar- 
rived there, all was excitement. A war 
had burst out among the tribes of Hondo 
as suddenly as the thunder-clap that an- 
nounces the coming torrents. It may 
have been developing for months, in the 
negotiations of the prefectural dele- 
gates; but now, rapid couriers were 
traveling over every interprovincial 
path, and armed alliances were being 
formed like magic. As a result of influ- 
ential intrigues, begun in Matsue, secret 
orders had gone out from Kyoto for the 
execution of a large number of promi- 
nent men in privileged clans, at various 
points, on the ground that they were 
non-conformists to a semi-political re- 
ligious formula which involved some 
kind of rite in which food and drink 
were given to the spirits of the ances- 
tors. One in this age can have but the 
vaguest idea of the ancient ceremonies 
which were made the token of loyalty, 
and the bearing of these upon the an- 
cient Japanese idea of national welfare ; 
but it is suflicient to say that all the 
military lords did not concur in the or- 
der; and, as it struck at some of their 
right-hand men, the movers of the in- 
quisition, and their allies, found them- 
selves confronted with more serious 
( 20 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


trouble than they had expected. A 
movement of counter destruction was 
ordered; and a war was on, the mad- 
ness and suddenness of which would be 
hard to imagine in connection with the 
organizations of such a primitive time. 
Long before Kimura reached the Straits 
on the way to join his family, there was 
an order that no man be permitted to 
cross. In those days, because of some 
strong and conservative daimyos in 
Kyushu, that island enjoyed remarkable 
insulation from the exciting struggles 
of Hondo. 

Kimura was arrested in his attempt 
to cross the Straits, and it was his for- 
tune to lie in prison for some months, 
near the present port of Shimonoseki. 
During that time, those disasters which 
seem to come in groups, visited Japan. 
A mighty typhoon swept all the south- 
ern coasts; the most disastrous in the 
memory of man. An earthquake which 
destroyed many villages, created a lake 
in a southern district; and a volcanic 
eruption at Asama buried a village and 
created a raised valley in a depression 
far away from the crater. W^en the 
war was finally decided, after unprece- 
dented bloodshed, all prisoners against 
whom there was no definite charge were 
released. This included Kimura, who, 
by not talking much, had left his keep- 
ers in ignorance as to his identity. 

(21) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


CHAPTER IV. 


A New Lease on Life. 


IMURA immediately crossed 
the Strait, which is less than 
half an hour in a boat, and 
sought out his family in Moji. 
It was like one rising from the 
dead. If we had words to de- 
scribe the scene of the family reunion it 
would furnish the most charming pas- 
sage in our story. The joy of his wife 
was almost unsupportable ; quite as deep 
as the sorrow of their parting at the 
Matsue prison cell; and the two shocks 
gave her a crown of prematurely gray 
hair. 

Not for one moment during his latter 
imprisonment had Kimura doubted that 
he would escape from prison and reach 
Kyushu. He felt assured that the God 
who called him on the night after his 
father’s burial and delivered him from 
the boiling bath would not permit any 
other obstruction to keep him from the 
mission of his life. His faith for his 
own earthly future had wavered, and 
his hope for an early visit of the Christ 
to Japan had gone into eclipse on the 
( 22 ) 



When the Sun Rose in the West. 


night of his interview with the myste- 
rious visitor in his death cell at Matsue. 
But now that he is free, he remembers 
that the man, if man he was, who visi- 
ted him that night, said that earth- 
quakes first must shake Japan, that 
storms must sweep it, and that those 
who dipped God’s servants in boiling 
baths must witness their country 
bathed in blood. “Now this,” Kimura 
reasoned, “must mean that those who 
put me in the boiling bath may live to 
see the day when the glory of the Lord 
shall beautify this chosen island. It 
must mean that the Prince of Peace 
will come in this generation. This 
seems especially plain now, since the 
prophecy of wars and storms and earth- 
quakes has been so strikingly fulfilled. 
My visitor also told me that on account 
of Japan’s love of darkness, and her 
violence, the Sun of Peace should be 
late in rising; but that may only mean 
that I shall be delayed for a few years 
in going upon this pilgrimage beyond 
the floods to bring Christ to Japan.” 

Thus reasoned Kimura, and thus his 
soul caught new enthusiasm. Inspired 
with the prospect of seeing the glory of 
God, he continued to give himself to 
prayer, and exhibiting among his fel- 
low beings those principles of mercy, 
temperance and purity, as they had 
come to him in his visions of the Prince 
( 23 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


of Peace. So complete was the offering 
of his soul and body; so much as dross 
did he count all earthly riches and 
honor, that he found it easy to get au- 
dience with God, and easy to overcome 
the world and live right; and it some- 
times seemed to him that there was a 
garden of peace in his soul much like 
what he hoped all of Japan should be 
when she should open her doors to the 
Prince of Peace. 

Kimura planned the scheme of his 
life with a business instinct. He would 
move to Nagasaki and build his family 
a nest; he would watch with devout in- 
terest the coming and going of all trav- 
elers, and confer with them, till he had 
determined the whereabouts of the Son 
of the Highest, revealed to him in his 
vision; then he would go and join him- 
self to this great One, and entreat Him 
to place Japan on His program as He 
proceeds to bless the nations of the 
world. “I can do it,” he said, “because 
this Divine agent that met me on the 
night after my father’s burial, and that 
saved me from the boiling bath, has 
given me the call.” So with the serene 
confidence of one who has the last word 
of proof, Kimura moved with his family 
to Nagasaki and purchased a house for 
them there. 


( 24 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


CHAPTER V. 

At Japan’s Golden Gate. 

AGASAKI is Japan’s back 
gate, her most western city; 
opening toward Shanghai and 
Hongkong and the ocean path 
to the coasts of India, she 
boasts of the most beautiful 
sunset in the world. 

It was the foreigner’s first port of 
entrance in historic times, and was 
the spot where the entering wedge of 
modernism was set in the latter half of 
last century. It is the place where the 
Roman Catholic Saint Xavier and his 
associates planted Christianity with 
more than their usual thoroughness, due 
to the diligence of Juan Fernandez, 
about the time of the Reformation in 
Europe. It, with the surrounding dis- 
tricts, is the spot made sacred by the 
blood and suffering of multitudes of 
martyrs; more, says Charles Henry 
Robinson, than perished, all told, in 
Rome under the Caesars; the region 
where the sparks of Gospel fire smould- 
ered from then till now, and where 
clandestine worshippers of Christ were 
discovered when the deadly clouds of 
Japanese suspicion and inquisition had 
( 25 ) 



When the Sun Rose in the West. 


rolled away; where a virile type of 
Christianity was quickly rooted, as soon 
as Japan was opened ; and where, from 
that day till this, an influential witness 
to the Full Salvation Gospel has not been 
wanting. 

The old name of Nagasaki, which 
antedates all history, was Tama’ no’ 
ura, which means the beach of pearls. 
It still has pearl fisheries, and we may 
easily conjecture that the Portugese 
sailors who came to this port at the 
close of the fifteenth century were 
guided by traditions passed down to 
them by men of their same pursuit in 
formeir centuries, dating back to the 
time of the celebrated Phoenician sail- 
ors, who traveled for the merchants of 
Tyre and Sidon. 

The scene, as nature would have it, is 
a harbor at the end of a finger-shaped 
bay which leads out into the sea and is 
protected from serf and typhoon by a 
half dozen islands, stationed on the 
boundary between bay and ocean. The 
ocean currents make directly to this 
point from the coasts of Foochow, Chi- 
na, thus providing for its early acci- 
dental discovery by primitive ships. 
Nagasaki stands at the end of the bay, 
guarded by a roof of mountains which 
shape themselves up like a herd of cam- 
els, lying down to rest, with their noses 
and folded legs slanting toward the wa- 
( 26 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


ter. One of the camel backs is a high 
mountain from which, after the days 
of Kimura, signals were passed to 
Tokio, seven or eight hundred miles 
eastward, when a foreign ship was 
sighted at sea. This was done by means 
of a fire kindled in the night time, to 
be reproduced successively on a line of 
mountains all the way to Tokio. It was 
long after Kimura’s time that the fol- 
lowing notice board was placed near a 
scene of execution: 

“Thus is it that hereafter shall be 
punished with death all those coming to 
this empire from Portugal, whether 
they be ambassadors or common sailors, 
and even though it be through mistak- 
ing the way or because of a tempest 
that they come: yea, every such person 
shall perish, even though he be the 
King of Portugal, or Buddha, or a Jap- 
anese god, or the Christian’s God Him- 
self, yea all shall die.” {From a His- 
tory of Christianity in Japan, by Otis 
Cary ) . But in the days of Kimura and 
before, no port was forbidden, as a rule, 
except by the expanse of ocean waters 
and the small size of ships. Nature 
simply made Nagasaki the first Japan- 
ese port. 

In a western comer of the city is 
Pilot Point, a terraced mountain of 
beautiful symmetry, which serves as a 
land-mark for sailors in the near-by 
( 27 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


seas. Just to the left of this, as you face 
it from the harbor, is “South Moun- 
tain,” and a little beyond is “East 
Mountain,” on which, as if answering 
to the fitness of things, Christian 
schools have been built. In a ravine 
formed by these mountains, well up 
from the track of the mountain tor- 
rents, one might have found the new 
home of Kimura, the incipient prophet 
of Japan. There stood a little house of 
two rooms, covered with rice straw; 
with portable walls, which slide in and 
out, and which might be lifted from the 
groove. The frame of the house was 
heavy hewn poles, but the walls were 
light and flimsy. It fronted towards a 
place of prayer on the top of an adjoin- 
ing mountain, and the back door was 
toward the Bay. 

When Kimura reached Nagasaki he 
found trading ships which had been 
drawn by the pearl market and the gold 
from the mines of Kyushu. As he 
learned to exchange communications 
with the sailors who bought and sold, 
he was told by an importer of pearls 
that some eastern scholars and astrolo- 
gers, miraculously guided by a star, had 
found near Jerusalem “the Hope of all 
nations,” in the person of a young He- 
brew; and that after they had found 
Him and worshipped Him, an angel had 
confirmed their worship. But, as the 
( 28 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


years went by, and other ships came 
from the same region, the reports were 
less confident. The “hope” announced 
by the wise men of the East, after their 
visit to the Christ, had ceased to cheer 
their neighbors, so the sailors said, and 
was a deferred hope. 

Impatient of delay, Kimura resolved 
to sail, and make his own investigation. 
The signs he had seen had made it clear 
to him that the time was at hand; so 
he paid money to the purser of a ship 
going nearest to the wise men’s country 
and made himself ready to go, even say- 
ing farewell to his family ; but after he 
went aboard, the ship remained in port 
all day because of signs of storm. At 
the close of that day he received news 
of an accident to one of his children, 
which proved almost fatal. This 
caused him to wait for another 
ship. The other ship proved to be a 
year in making its arrival, and then it 
lay long in port to finish its trading. 
Kimura’s passage having been engaged, 
he awaited prayerfully the day set for 
sailing. But, before that day had ar- 
rived, as he walked one evening upon 
the beach, wishing that he might have 
on the day of sailing as favorable a 
wind as then was blowing, he saw an 
excited crowd of people gathered about 
the dock, making angry gestures, and 
saw the oarsmen hurriedly pushing the 
( 29 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


ship out to sea, while some sailors nerv- 
ously arranged the sails. Japanese 
small boats also were thrust out, as if 
for attack; but the superior weapons 
of the foreigners made attack impossi- 
ble. For some reason, a Japanese had 
been murdered by a foreign boatsman ; 
and his fellow seamen, taking his part 
to prevent arrest, had produced a riot, 
from which the foreign crew barely es- 
caped with their lives. 

A council of the feudal lords was 
held, and it was decided that no foreign 
ship should be permitted to land for 
twenty years; and any Japanese vessel 
that crossed the sea to the Asiatic coast 
was to be seized on its return and the 
owners imprisoned. Thus Kimura’s 
hope seemed suddenly to sink. Nothing 
to do but to wait and to pray. But his 
beautiful life shone forth in the com- 
munity with increasing power. It was 
almost impossible to be mean in his 
presence ; and men of violence, and lov- 
ers of strong drink, and impure char- 
acters, shrank from him and went else- 
where to practice their dark deeds. 
The sorrowing found comfort, the dis- 
tressed found relief; and serious men 
inquired how they might derive the 
peace that sustained his serene spirit 
and brightened his radiant face. He 
was a man with a purpose and a hope. 

He waited twenty years, and it seem- 
( 30 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


ed little more than twenty days. The 
time being up, and there being no for- 
eign boat in sight, Kimura shipped on 
a Japanese boat which was rigged and 
ready for a trip to a port in China, 
thinking to reship more quickly from 
the Chinese port; but, upon arriving 
there, and being informed that no for- 
eign boats ever came that way, he had 
to return home on the ship that carried 
him out. I 


( 31 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


CHAPTER VI. 
Caesar’s Frown. 


HEN Kimura returned from 
China he found a new stir- 
ring in the national con- 
sciousness of Japan. Closer 
confederation had developed 
between the tribes in Hondo 
and Kyushu; and some ambitious lead- 
ers were pleading for an alliance with 
a great world power far away. There 
were calamity criers, who taught that 
some day China or Korea would bear 
down upon Japan and make bondsmen 
of their people. They had learned of 
the greatness of Rome, which was too 
far off to harm Japan, and in their 
crude view of world geography might 
serve to hold China and Korea in check. 
Commissioners were sent to Rome, but 
their long pilgrimage was in vain. 
Rome would not form a treaty. Ki- 
mura, while in prayer, had felt im- 
pressed to await the return of this com- 
mission and hear their report before he 
should again undertake to go. On the 
heels of this resolve, he had more 
chances to go than usual; several ships 
came and went from his port, while he 
( 32 ) 



When the Sun Rose in the West. 


held to his purpose and waited. On one 
of these ships he met an old sailor whom 
he had seen in port years before ; a de- 
vout man, of Jewish pursuasion. This 
man had recently been present at Jeru- 
salem on the day of Pentecost; that 
Pentecost at which devout men were 
present from “every nation under heav- 
en.” The old sailor had there believed 
the Gospel. It would be difficult to de- 
scribe the thrill that Kimura felt when 
for once he could meet with a living fol- 
lower of that Christ whom, in seeking 
to approach, he had all these years been 
as a bird, beating against the bars of 
its cage. Of course this Christ-wor- 
shipper had seen the Lord, Kimura 
thought, and he hastened to improve his 
limited means of communication, so 
that he could learn more. What nation 
is Christ to favor next, and where is 
He now? These were among Kimura’s 
questions. But when told by the sailor 
that he had never seen Christ, the old 
Japanese was perplexed. How a man 
could trust and love one he had not seen 
was not clear to his mind. But the 
story was told as the sailor heard it, and 
Kimura’s faith caught a clearer vision. 
Christ had been born; He had fulfilled 
His ministry and announced His world 
program; He had been crucified, but 
had conquered the grave. The sailor 
failed to explain the ascension to Ki- 
( 33 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West, 


mura, so he still believed that he could 
go and bring Christ from the Roman 
empire into Japan. 

Instead of months, as the optimistic 
Kimura expected, it was years, before 
the results of the effort to form a treaty 
with Rome were well understood. When 
the commission returned from their te- 
dious journey to Rome, Kimura made a 
special visit to learn facts, and get the 
views of prominent men on matters re- 
ligious. The shrewd Buddhists of India 
had filled their minds with the theory 
that Buddha could satisfy the hungry 
heart of Japan, and representatives of 
Buddhism were to be invited from 
China, with a view to supplying the de- 
ficiences in provision for Japan’s spirit- 
ual needs. They told Kimura that 
Christ had been in Rome, had chal- 
lenged the authority of the gods, and 
was under the frown of the Emperor. 
That His group of followers there was 
small and without influence. Kimura 
saw that the testimony of these wit- 
nesses was colored with prejudice. He 
believed their report about Rome frown- 
ing upon Christ; but he believed that 
since Rome had frowned upon both Ja- 
pan and Christ, this was another argu- 
ment proving that the Prince of Peace 
was Japan’s Christ. 


(34) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


CHAPTER VII. 

Sunset. 

IMURA returned home with 
firm determination to take the 
next ship, without delay, and 
invite Christ to Japan; he be- 
lieved now, more surely than 
ever, that Christ would accept 
the invitation ; and that by bringing the 
world’s Redeemer in ahead of Buddha 
he would give Japan the real before she 
received the counterfeit, and thus save 
them from years of darkness and 
misery. 

He did take ship directly for a port 
which led to one of Asia’s great South- 
western highways, and he bade fair to 
make his way to Jerusalem. But his 
ship, driven from its course by adverse 
winds, was finally stranded on one of 
the Loo Choo Islands. There, through 
hunger and cold and exposure, his 
strong body, already declining under 
the weight of years, gave way and left 
him confirmed in feebleness. After 
many months a passing schooner 
brought him back to Nagasaki. As he 
came faltering into his house his family 
wept for joy; and he wept, with an un- 
speakable pathos which told them that 
( 35 ) 



When the Sun Rose in the West. 


he had shot his last arrow at the mark ; 
that, henceforth, his hope, which had 
alternately grown brighter, must grow 
dimmer each day, till the sunset. 

What Kimura thought to be the ris- 
ing of Japan’s spiritual sun, after all, 
was the rear glow of a Sun which had 
risen upon others, but which must take 
its course, not from west to east, but 
from east to west; a Sun which must 
lighten up a thousand wild hills and 
dark valleys before its beams should fall 
upon beautiful Japan. It must start 
somewhere; and such a glorious Sun 
could not start his course without burst- 
ing backward in his glow as if he were 
going to rise in reverse order, upon his 
background. 

But the Sun had arisen on Kimura’s 
soul. Such a beautiful old age has sel- 
dom adorned any community. The later 
news that leaked through from the land 
he had sought to visit gave signs that 
the shadows were deepening. But, as if 
by way of recompense, some strange 
light from heaven shone brighter and 
brighter upon Kimura’s soul, and he 
seemed to hold council with Japan’s fu- 
ture Redeemer. All looked upon him 
as a prophet; and he was one of those 
fortunate men who have been able to 
hand down a spiritual and moral legacy 
to their children, duplicating them- 
selves in their sons, through successive 
( 36 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


generations. The ashes of the ancient 
saint, planted in a hillside in full view 
of Nagasaki’s port, were to be as pre- 
cious seed, awaiting the sunshine and 
rain. The thousands of unselfish pray- 
ers he prayed, free from cant and bab- 
bling and superstition, were to be bot- 
tled up a few short centuries, and then 
poured out upon Japan. 

He had not mistaken the stern 
prophecy of his Visitor in Matsue. Not 
one, but many storms, floods, earth- 
quakes and wars must run their course 
before the Healer of Hearts should walk 
their village streets. But certainly He 
should come ; the time would be long to 
our finite minds, but a thousand years 
are as a day with the Lord of all the 
earth. Thus spoke the same Voice in 
Kimura’s room as he lay dying ; for the 
same Visitor that gave him his call 
when he was young came to him that 
night. Then said the dying Kimura, 
“Now I understand, and now I die in 
peace.” And as the old saint passed 
away, the Christ whom, having not seen 
he loved, appeared at the entrance of 
heaven to receive his spirit. It was 
midnight; but to him the room was 
filled with light, while the hillside and 
beach around his house shone like noon- 
day. And he recognized his Visitor; 
who, for the third time in life, stood at 
his side. First, on the night after his 
( 37 ) 


When the Sun Rose in the West. 


father’s burial, when he only heard the 
voice, not seeing the form. Next, on 
the night after he was sentenced to the 
boiling bath, when he saw in the shad- 
ows the form of his Visitor. But on 
that last night this Visitor stood out in 
heavenly splendor before the enrap- 
tured eyes of Kimura, and said to him : 
“I have given you a call, and you have 
fulfilled it as a faithful servant; and I 
shall patiently linger near this island 
Kingdom, through the changing years, 
till the fulness of time is come, when 
the desire of your heart shall be grant- 
ed. Do you understand?” Then, smil- 
ing sweetly as he passed away, Kimura 
said : “Now I understand.” 


THE END 


(38) 



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